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The Numbers
“Alright, sir, here’s your change.” The cashier opened up the cash register and grabbed nineteen dollars in change. He then quickly ripped my receipt from the machine and handed me my stuff, “Thank you for shopping at Target.” I rolled my eyes as I placed the money into my wallet and double checked my bag to see if the cashier had given me the correct bag. Inside the small plastic bag laid a game case labeled in big letters, Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles. I smiled; there was no way that Kelsey would dislike this game. I triumphantly walked away from the checkout line and started to shuffle the change in my wallet around until something scribbled onto the five dollar bill that I had received.
“027-15-847-254863” read the scribbled message. I silently racked my brain, trying to decipherer the numbers for a meaning.
“There’s too many numbers for it to be a phone number…” I muttered to myself and took out my phone only to see that my first phone book entry had the same amount of numbers in it. It’d explain a lot because my cousin, Amelia, lived in France. I looked at the number again and hastily went back to into line and picked up a long-distance phone card; there was no way that I was going to make this call on my cell phone on a weekday.
I sat in silence as I held the ringing receiver to my head, the dead pulse of the waiting tone seemed to last forever, but someone finally picked up.
“Allô!” A girl’s voice came from the phone.
“Allô!” I replied hesitantly, “Bonjour, madame. Ici Zach Bussell.”
“Bonjour, Zach. Comment ça va?”
“Bien.” I spoke with confidence; this French I could understand, “Et toi?”
“Ca va.” The girl responded before saying with a stern voice, “Fais attention! J’ai une carte pour toi. Elle lit deux cent cinquante-quatre, trois cent vingt-sept, deux mille deux cent soixante-deux. C’est fini.” The girl giggled, “J’amie telephone-toi plus tard.” The line the cut off and I stood there with a dead dial tone ringing in my ear.
I placed the phone down and thought about the last things that she had said, what the card had said. Two fifty four, three twenty seven, two thousand two hundred seventy two. I wrote down the numbers and looked at the combination, “An American phone number.” I picked up the phone again and dialed it in and got an automated answering machine.
“Thank you for calling this number.” The default voice called out, “We can’t pick up the phone up right now, so please feel free to visit us at 5005 James Way, Killeen, Texas.” I scribbled down the address; it looked like I would have to visit that address. I frowned, thinking of how much of a fool I could turn out to be, chancing around someone’s random notes. It was just something else for me to think about as I made the hour drive to Killeen…
Lucky for me, traffic wasn’t as bad as I thought, as I took several back roads and made the trip to Killen in forty-five minutes of random music blaring out of my car’s poor stereo system. I looked at the online directions and turned off of the highway and into a small neighborhood, simply looking at the street names until I found James Way. I turned into it and soon found my destination, a small, red brick, one-story house. I hesitantly got out of my car and knocked on the door just to be greeted by a smiling blond haired woman.
“Oh, hello, sir.” The woman said as she opened the door completely, “What can I do for ya’?”
Smiling in return, I let out a nervous laugh, “I doubt you’re going to believe what I have to say.”
“Try me.” The woman challenged, “I’m a teacher.”
“Well, I found a number written on my five dollar bill, so I called it and got another number, which produced your address.” I explained with some meager details, “And now I’m here and I’m guessing that you have something to give me.”
“Actually, yes, I do.” The woman said as she walked back into her house, “One of my friends left me with a key to a safety deposit box. She told me to give it to the person who found her note. I guess you’re that person, so I must tell you that the safety deposit box is located in the bank by the Killeen Harold’s offices.” She handed me a small gold colored that was embellished with a bank’s emblem and a series of four numbers.
“Where’s that…?” I smiled again, “I’m… not from this area, so I’m kinda lost.”
“Oh, that isn’t a problem, hun.” The woman waved her hand casually, “Just drive out of this neighborhood and take a right, then take your first left. Keep driving on that road until you see the bank, it’s really big, so I doubt you can miss.”
“You’d be surprised with what I can miss.” I muttered to myself.
“Don’t worry, it’s bigger than the numbers on that dollar and you found those fairly easily.”
The woman was right; it was fairly hard not to miss the giant Flame Bank that stood as a tall dark spire next to the smaller and seemingly insignificant building that housed the Killeen Harold. I steered my car into the parking lot of the bank and piled out, silently praying that this would be the last stop. I went up to the counter and showed the key to the teller, “Do you know if this key belongs to this bank?”
The teller smiled, “Yes, sir, this does belong to this bank, but it’s fairly old.” She looked at the key and giggled, “That emblem was replaced several years ago. Do you want me to take you to the safety deposit box area?”
“Yes, please.” I responded. The teller got out of her seat and walked across the counter, her red ponytail trailing after her.
“This way, sir.” She called, beckoning for me to follow her. We walked past a security gate to a rather large doorway. The teller took out her own key and swiped it in front of a small block on the door’s dark wooden surface. The door suddenly opened to reveal a small elevator and the teller placed my key into the keyhole that was there. The elevator closed its doors and lurched downwards.
“This safety deposit box is at least ten years old, so it’s in the basement.” The teller explained, excitement ringing in her words, “I’ve never been down there before, and so I’m a bit excited to see the place for myself.” The elevator dinged and the doors opened up revealing a small poorly-lit room that contained a single key hole along with one desk and two chairs.
“I guess I just put my key into that hole?” I asked the teller, who just shrugged. I cautiously slid the gold key into the keyhole and watched as the whole wall lit up.
“Accessing computer data,” A computer’s automated voice muttered, “Key verified as number 29377484. Requesting safety deposit box number 0097.” The keyhole was pushed forward as a box forced its way from the wall.
“Teller, please wait in the elevator until the customer is ready to go back to the first floor.” The computer voice requested, “Customer, please review the contents of this safety deposit box and decide what you want to do with it. When you are done, please take your key out of the lock.” The teller went back to the elevator as I went to pick up the stuff from the box. I reached into the box and picked up a rather large package. I went to the table and opened it up and found several stacks of one hundred dollar bills among an aged letter.
To Whoever Found This Letter:
Congratulations, you’ve found my legacy, the mass of money that I stole from various banks and jewelry stores before I decided to retire and disappear from the press.
Due to the fact that you actually followed the clues that I left on many dollar bills, I feel that you deserve this amount of cash. The question is what will you do with it? Will you selfishly spend the money? Or will you perhaps try to return the money to its rightful owners? The choice is up to you now.
Either way, I hope that you experience such generous luck later in your life.
--Erica Ruby
Jewelry Thief Extraordinaire
I stared at the letter and then at the box filled with cash. What should I do? Should I follow what Erica would most likely suggest to me and spend the money or return the money to its rightful owners?
I rolled my eyes, “generous luck,” my foot. I was going to have a really hard time deciding what to do with this money. I placed my head onto my hands and decided to think about what I should do with my newfound fortune.
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